UN WOMEN Jobs - 72050- UN Women - National Consultant to support Tirana M

UN Women - National Consultant to support Tirana Municipality in the monitoring process and lessons learned of Women Entrepreneurs Grant

Advertised on behalf of

UN WOMEN

Location :

Tirana, ALBANIA

Type of Contract :

Other

Starting Date :

Application Deadline :

10-May-17 (Midnight New York, USA)

Post Level :

Other

Duration of Initial Contract :

Languages Required :

English

Expected Duration of Assignment :

Up to 20 working days over period May – August 2017

UNDP is committed to achieving workforce diversity in terms of gender, nationality and culture. Individuals from minority groups, indigenous groups and persons with disabilities are equally encouraged to apply. All applications will be treated with the strictest confidence. UNDP does not tolerate sexual exploitation and abuse, any kind of harassment, including sexual harassment, and discrimination. All selected candidates will, therefore, undergo rigorous reference and background checks.

Background

UN Women, grounded in the vision of equality enshrined in the Charter of the United Nations, works for the elimination of discrimination against women and girls; the empowerment of women; and the achievement of equality between women and men as partners and beneficiaries of development, human rights, humanitarian action and peace and security. Placing women’s rights at the center of all its efforts, UN Women leads and coordinates United Nations system efforts to ensure that commitments on gender equality are translated into action throughout the world. It provides strong and coherent leadership in support of Member States’ priorities and efforts while building effective partnerships with civil society and other relevant actors. UN Women in Albania operates in four core areas, focused on women’s economic empowerment, promoting women in decision making and their active political participation, eliminating violence against women (EVAW) and supporting gender responsive national planning and budgeting.

Women economic empowerment both through increased access to labour markets as well as enhanced opportunities for women entrepreneurship is a policy area that is gradually gaining attention in government policy as a tool to guarantee consolidation of women’s rights. Currently the National Plan of Women’s Entrepreneurship 2014-2020 is in place and endorsed and is being implemented by a series of stakeholders in the country at the central (policy) and local level. For the first time in 2015 GoA approved and allocated a 250,000USD fund to support Women Entrepreneurs through interest rates coverage. This was ground breaking recognition and policy support to women led businesses by government.

To continue the momentum and build on the success of the 2015 women specific fund, the Municipality of Tirana established in 2016 a Competitive Fund for Women Entrepreneurs at the local level and intended for women entrepreneurs operating in Tirana. The fund, which is now in place and operational, supported directly various industries of women owned micro- small and medium enterprises as well as encouraged women led start up activities. The total fund size was 6.000.000 ALL for a period of 1 year and will be replicated in 2017. 43 women entrepreneurs and intending to start-up a business applied to this fund, also due to the large information campaign organized by UN Women and the municipality. 27 women passed the first stage and were supported by designated training and mentoring programs to draft their full business proposals and related business plan. The operational guideline has a dedicated section on the process of Monitoring and Evaluation of winning businesses. The process as such aims to monitor the success and effects of the funds implementation by visiting the approved applicants under the Project. Each company will be visited monthly for the first six months, then quarterly until the end of the two-year contract period. Being the first pilot, the municipality intends to draft a monitoring tool, which can remain with the Municipality. This will serve to identify gaps and propose remedies which can be taken on bard also for next year’s fund.

In this frame the Municipality of Tirana is seeking the support of a national consultant to assist in the drafting of monitoring tools for measurement of business progress and quality check as well as guide/lead toward new business ideas for similar future project initiatives. In addition, a lesson learned report is needed to provide guidance on this year fund.

Duties and Responsibilities

Under the direct supervision of UN Women National Programme Coordinator on Women Economic Empowerment, and in close cooperation with the Municipality of Tirana, the National Consultant will conceptualize the monitoring and final assessment of businesses methodology as well as conduct it in practice for this first year round in cooperation worth the Municipality’s team. In developing the required task the Consultant will be guided by best practices of other countries that have set up and made functional similar funds and monitoring systems, key UN Women documents, including the NAP on Women Entrepreneurship 2014-2020 and in accordance with the existing Legal Basis on which the Fund for Women Entrepreneurship is administered.

Task and Responsibilities:

The National Consultant is expected to work closely with UN Women National Programme Coordinator, as well as coordinate very closely with the Municipality of Tirana.

Specifically, the National Consultant is expected to:

Draft the methodology and work plan for the monitoring and final assessment of businesses and related conducted practice;
Draft a monitoring tool for the fund delivery and quality check;
Conduct the monitoring of businesses and final assessment;
Identify gaps and propose solutions and recommendations for improvements;
Advise and provide on the job technical assistance to the Municipality’s team in charge of implementing the fund;
Prepare a final report, in English and Albanian, with identified gaps and recommendations for next year’s replication of the fund;

Expected deliverables:

Detailed work plan for the consultancy and description of methodology to be employed;
Final Standard Operation Manual for the Monitoring Plan in place;
Final Report with gaps and recommendations produced;
A final report on the work progress during whole consultancy

Duration of the Work:

The National Consultant will be contracted for a maximum of 20 working days during the estimated period of May – August 2017 to perform specified tasks.

Competencies

Core Values:

Respect for Diversity
Integrity
Professionalism

Core Competencies:

Awareness and Sensitivity Regarding Gender Issues
Accountability
Creative Problem Solving
Effective Communication
Inclusive Collaboration
Stakeholder Engagement
Leading by Example

Please visit this link for more information on UN Women’s Core Values and Competencies: http://www.unwomen.org/-/media/headquarters/attachments/sections/about%20us/employment/un-women-employment-values-and-competencies-definitions-en.pdf

Functional Competencies:

The expert should be proactive and can discuss openly with all senior officials of Tirana Municipality; other key stakeholders, private sector and development partners;
Strong inter-personal and communications (oral and written) skills, efficiency in a multi-tasking environment;
Ability to work and adapt to a dynamic working environment, judgment, results-orientation, and ability to perform under pressure.

Required Skills and Experience

Academic Qualifications:

Advanced degree in gender and development, public policies, or related fields;

Work experience:

At least 7 years of development experience with an emphasis on women entrepreneurship and women’s access to finance and crediting tools;
Proven experience in building and conducting monitoring instruments for fund/business delivery and quality check;
Proven experience in report preparations, drafting of related lessons learned and recommendations;

Language requirement:

Fluency in English and Albanian (written and spoken);

Recommended Presentation of Offer

Qualified and interested candidates are asked to submit their application no later than 10th May 2017. Applications should include:

A Letter of Confirmation of Interest and Availability including a brief description explaining why the individual considers him/herself as the most suitable for the assignment, and a methodology, if applicable, on how the assignment will be approached and completed.
P11 Form including past experience in similar assignment. Can be downloaded at: http://www.unwomen.org/en/about-us/employment
Financial Proposal specifying the daily fee and the overall amount in Albanian Lek for the tasks and anticipated number of days specified in this assignment.

Note: Failure to submit financial proposal will result in automatic disqualification.

Please note that the financial proposal is all-inclusive and shall take into account various expenses incurred by the consultant/contractor during the contract period (e.g. fee and any other relevant expenses related to the performance of services). In the framework of this assignment, neither travel nor accommodation costs are foreseen to occur.

Payment will be made as per the payment schedule in the contract upon (i) satisfactory completion of tasks; (ii) provision of deliverables specified in the ToRs; (iii) submission of and approval of final report; and (iv) submission of the respective time-sheet and invoice.

Evaluation of applicants:

Candidates will be evaluated using a cumulative analysis method taking into consideration the combination of the applicants’ qualifications and financial proposal. Contract will be awarded to the individual consultant whose offer has been evaluated and determined as:

Responsive/compliant/acceptable; and
Having received the highest score out of below defined technical and financial criteria.

Applications will be assessed according to the following technical criteria:

Advanced degree in gender and development, public policies, or related fields; (max. points 10).
At least 7 years of development experience with an emphasis on women entrepreneurship and women’s access to finance and crediting tools (max. points 20);
Proven experience in building and conducting monitoring instruments for fund/business delivery and quality check (max. points 20);
Proven experience in report preparations, drafting of related lessons learned and recommendations, (max. points 20);

Only candidates obtaining a minimum of 70% (49 points) in the technical evaluation would be considered for financial evaluation.

The maximum number of points assigned to the financial proposal is allocated to the lowest price proposal. All other price proposals receive points in inverse proportion.

The calculation formula applied is as follow:

p = 30 (µ/z); where: p = points for the financial proposal being evaluated; µ = price of the lowest priced proposal; z = price of the proposal being evaluated.

How to Submit the Application: To submit your application online, please follow the steps below:

Download and complete the UN Women Personal History Form (P11)- http://www.unwomen.org/en/about-us/employment
Merge your UN Women Personal History Form (P11), the Financial Proposal, and Cover Letter into a single file. The system does not allow for more than one attachment to be uploaded;
Click on the Job Title (job vacancy announcement);
Click 'Apply Now' button, fill in necessary information on the first page, and then click 'Submit Application;'
Upload your application/single file as indicated above with the merged documents (underlined above);
You will receive an automatic response to your email confirming receipt of your application by the system.

UN Women retains the right to contact references directly. Due to the large numbers of applications we receive, we are able to inform only the successful candidates about the outcome or status of the selection process.